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Is there anyone that went to university before you? Were you the first one from your family to go?
Yes, it is like that in our family, but you always have relatives, like cousins, you notice them going to university.
At that time when you noticed them preparing to go to university, what were your thoughts about this?
When I was young, I thought it seemed like a very exhausting process, there was a period of time when you had to study all day long.
Revise, practice, and take tests. But after getting into university your life will become relaxed and happy.
This was my imagination of what university would be like when I was a child.
Why did you think that university was more laid-back? Because of the influence of TV or movies?
They probably teach us to see or feel it that way. It seems like you can do whatever you want to do in university.
Just, whatever you feel like doing, just do it. If you want to study, then study. If you want to get full marks on your test, then do it.
If you just want to get 60 marks then study that much.
There are many things that you can decide for yourself.
I would not call it more relaxed, It is more to do with freedom.
So why did you want to go to university? Did you think about this question before?
This is a pretty straightforward question, but my editor said I had to ask it.
This reminds me of the feeling hen I was interviewing for university and they would ask me why I wanted to go to their school.
Actually, going to university, like I mentioned before, is seen as something you should do since you are a child,
but when I got to high school was when I really decided by myself that I wanted to go to university,
because back then I was in Chiayi, and I felt like I just spent the whole day trapped in my classroom.
In the second and third years of high school you have to start preparing the university admission tests,
so you spend all day trapped in the classroom and it is something that does not make sense,
studying some things that you feel are of utterly no use to you, some trivial information.
For example reading the Classic of Rites (Confucian book on ancient Chinese customs), is pointless, really, how could it possibly help you?
The emphasis on passing tests is too strong.
So I thought, I need to go to university, I have to get out of this place.
And I thought, if I go to university, maybe I can better understand our society, and find out what I really want to do.
Before going to Yangming University did you have any expectations for your faculty?
My thoughts about the faculty were that it would definitely be a place full of all kinds of geniuses and smart people.
And I thought all the top students from all the best high schools would be in it.
And I thought after this, I?m not going to be able to slack off on my studies because everybody is outstanding,
in any case, these opinions were probably general thoughts about university.
At that time, before I had got into university, my friend told me that university was a place to study, but it was also full of dreams.
So I thought, going there, I would be able to figure out what I really want,
and I hoped that after getting into university I would be able to better understand society.
I just thought that, since I was a kid in Chiayi till now,
just like I said, I always studied pointless things, things that cannot help you understand the world, society, or even yourself. 36 0:04:29,000 --> 0:04:33,555 And now I can get these things from university.
When you went to apply you had to go up to Yangming campus right? Because you had to have your interview right?
Did you have any particular feelings at that time, when you first saw the campus?
My feelings when I saw the campus? I just felt... My first thought was that this was a pretty ugly campus, because...
later on you realize that it is just the way it is, because it is lacking a diversity of students.
They claim that it is now like a regular university. But it is not, it is still lacking in diversity.
It is a bit better now, there is a bit more variety. I just thought, this really is a fairly ugly university.
But at that time, when you are just a high school student, none of that matters, you just hope for a...
at that time you just hope to get in, and you do not think or look at things too closely.
You just pray that later, when you are having your interview, the professor will be left with a good impression of you.
When you saw Yangming campus where you a bit disappointed? With your idea of what university was like, I mean?
Actually not too bad, because what I saw was just the surface, but your concept of university does not have much to do with what it looks like.
Obviously everybody just wants it to be like when you walk in, there are pretty squares, and green fields, big departmental buildings, etc.
For Yangming, it is origin is a little different; at the beginning it was a medical school, and then they added other departments to make it a university.
Originally the campus space was limited, the surface was slanted because it was built on the slope of a hill.
So it did not have that kind of, there was no small door with "National University of whatnot" written on top to go into university,
and after going in you would see lots of buildings, a large pong with ducks in it, a field of grass, etc...
This university, it does not have that.
But of course, this is just the superficial level, so it is not a problem.